The Lincoln School Committee provides oversight and direction to the operation of the Lincoln Public School District. The Committee's role, responsibilities and high level operating procedures are established in the context of various applicable general laws of the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. Our primary responsibilities are to establish the educational vision and goals for the district, approve the budget, establish policies for the district, and hire and evaluate the Superintendent. The implementation and achievement of these goals lies with the Superintendent and the administrative team. More simply stated, the role of the School Committee is not to run the schools, but rather to establish the policies by which the schools are run, and to oversee their maintenance in a broad sense. For more detailed information about what the School Committee does and the roles of other groups and individuals who work in and interact with the Lincoln Public Schools, please see the "roles and responsibilities" document. This document will help you to understand to whom you should turn with specific questions about different issues.

Members

The Committee is composed of five elected members who are elected to staggered 3 year terms. In addition, in order to better represent the full community, the Committee also has three non-voting members representing the Hanscom and Boston METCO communities. The non-voting members participate fully in the work of the Committee, and their positions on matters before the committee are sought prior to any decisions made by the voting members. The Commander of the Hanscom Air Force Base appoints the two Hanscom representatives to the Committee. The School Committee appoints the Boston representative with input from the Boston parent community.

The Committee conducts its business in regular public meetings under the rules of the Massachusetts Open Meeting Law. Generally, these meetings occur every two weeks during the school year, and once or twice over the summer, on Thursday evenings. Most meetings are held in the Hartwell building in Lincoln, but occasionally the meetings are held at Hanscom Air Force Base or in Boston. The calendar of meetings, along with agendas and minutes for those meetings can be viewed on this web site by selecting the appropriate menu item to the left.

The minutes and agendas of all the School Committee meetings will be posted as quickly as possible. Typically, the agenda is available several days prior to the meeting date. The minutes of a meeting are typically approved at the following meeting, and are typically posted within a few days after that. An archive of agenda and minutes is available for the current year or prior years.

Your Input

The Committee strives to make decisions that are in the interests of student learning, based on the best available objective information. The members welcome input from the public to help inform it. Brief public comments can be made during a designated time at the beginning of each school committee meeting. In addition, a series of informal forums is held during the year to provide time for a more casual dialog with members. Members can also be reached via email or telephone.

The School Committee menu selections on the left will allow you to access selected public documents that relate to the work of the Lincoln K-8 School Committee. If you cannot find the public document that you seek here, you may request a copy by contacting the Central Administration Office at 781-259-9409. The Committee's email address is schoolcomm@lincnet.org.